


The Letter Club

by flickerbyniall



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: M/M, a bbc sherlock au, i love sherlock, this is a sherlock au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-07
Updated: 2019-06-07
Packaged: 2020-04-12 11:37:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,121
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19131259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flickerbyniall/pseuds/flickerbyniall
Summary: In which Niall is back from war only to learn that London is a battlefield of its own.Or Harry is Sherlock Holmes and Niall is John Watson.





	The Letter Club

His walking stick resonates in the entire abandoned warehouse as he walks in and Niall wonders if he’s really this stupid. One second he was walking down London streets and the next, public phones start ringing wherever he stands until he picks up and this mysterious voice of a woman demands him to get into a car that appears out of nowhere to take him to this empty place with the only indication of walking straight by a woman dressed in a suit with tattoos covering her hands and arms.

He's not intimated, he's just curious and a bit impressed. Perhaps he wants to meet the person capable of using security cameras and public phones at their will, he especially wants to know what a person like that would want with a person like him. Niall leans his weight on the walking stick to speed up his steps until he sees a silhouette at the end of the hallway.

It’s a woman leaning on a closed umbrella with her other hand on her waist. As Niall gets closer, he gets a better look at her. She’s beautiful in a way that makes his bones tremble and his feet trip, her eyes are cold and stoic, her skin is fair and Niall can see some freckles behind the makeup and the red lips. She’s also young, way younger than he expected by the sound of her voice on the phone, assuming it _was_ her voice.

So, he immediately starts looking for a way out:  he tries to calculate the distance between the center of the place, the door he just entered from and the door behind the woman; he tries to think how fast he can be with a defective knee and how much damage would he need to make to get out of danger. He moves slowly, taking all in before, remembering the feeling, the spark of adrenaline running down his spine, his brain working full speed and the smirk he's trying to hide.

Her dark green eyes follow him until he stands in front of her and a single chair in the middle of the open space. He clears his throat. Her hair goes down to her shoulders and looks like a brown wavy cascade that moves elegantly at the slightest head movement. Her hand falls into the left pocket of the black suit pants. She opens her coat with the other hand, holding the umbrella under her fingers and Niall can see the black and white jacket.

She's rich. He can tell by the way her hair shines on the top of her head to the expensive high heels with the red coloring part at the back. He also knows by the way she's looking at him, examining him. Niall loses up the collar of his shirt and puts both hands on the handle of his walking stick.

“Sit down, John," she says with the same refined tone he heard on the phone just moments ago.

"You know," Niall says looking around him, “I’ve got a phone.” He tilts his head to the right to get a better look of the woman in front of him. “I mean, very clever and all that,” he smiles with the same arrogance he sees in her face, “But you could’ve just called me.”

“When one is avoiding the attention of Sherlock Holmes,” she smiles, looking at her feet and Niall’s smile slowly start to fade away. _How does she know Harry?_ “One learns to be discreet.”

Niall looks around him, then. He is in some kind of warehouse and it’s completely empty besides for the two of them standing in the middle of a large room and the car that drove Niall here, which is waiting to return him behind him, according to what that lady with the tattoos; Louise, Niall remembers when she introduced herself; said. The lights are on but the place smells like it's been washed with rainwater and Niall's starting to get a stuffy nose.

“Your knee must be hurting you. Sit down,” she says again, pointing at the chair behind him with her hand but Niall doesn’t move.

“I don’t want to sit down," Niall answers, not breaking eye contact as she smirks. “Who are you?” he finally asks.

“Who I am is not important right now,” she says, looking directly at his eyes with a smile. “I’m more interested in your relationship with Sherlock Holmes.”

“What do you have to do with Harry?” Niall replies with a question and her whole facial expression changes.

She slowly frowns, letting every single part of face fall as she looks at Niall like she’s seeing him for the first time. Maybe Niall accidentally found a weak spot, something the person in front of him didn't expect him to know, but he can't figure out what exactly it was. That is probably due to the fact of how hard he's trying to not look nervous or freak out right now, but if there's anything he has learned in the last couple of days then he should start getting used to this kind of thing.

"So you call him Harry," she says and Niall can hear the surprise in her voice. "Only a few people call him that.” And he doesn’t know if she’s whispering to him or to herself.

The woman clears her throat and looks to her right holding the umbrella with both hands. She's smiling again, but it's a different smile; it's calm and almost imperceptible like it's a secret.

“What’s your connection with Sherlock Holmes?” she asks again and Niall physically steps back.

"I don't have one," Niall answers, eager for clearing his throat too but not letting himself show any type of weakness, even if it’s over something he cannot control. “I barely know him,” he explains and then Niall realizes he doesn’t know Harry at all. “I met him… a few days ago.”

The woman laughs and Niall can see it in her eyes, she doesn’t believe it. But that’s the thing, Niall is not lying. Two days ago he was struggling to find an affordable place to live in London and the next day he bumps into Ed, an old friend, and he introduces him to _Sherlock Holmes_ , who was looking for a flatmate, and then it was all a blur.

_Harry and Niall were having some breakfast in the restaurant of one of his acquaintances to talk about Baker Street, the rent and the requirements when Lestrade called him for a case. Harry asked him if he wanted to come along and Niall hasn't agreed to something that fasts in a long time. He knew very little about Sherlock Holmes but what he did know is that he works for the police solving cases which only a few other people seemed to know._

_“He’s not a public person.” Said Ed when he told him about Harry before introducing one to the other._

_Niall studied with Ed Sheeran in an all-boys boarding school back in Ireland and for some reason, he bumped into him in a park in London after many years of not hearing about each other and after a bit of small talk, he said that he knows someone who’s also looking for a flatmate. Half an hour later, they're both standing in front of a Laboratory's door with Sherlock Holmes inside._

_If he has to be honest, Niall didn’t believe a word Ed told him about Harry. Legends are always being exaggerated and even the name “Sherlock Holmes” sounded like an urban legend. So he wasn’t prepared at all for what was waiting on the other side of the door or how he felt completely unarmed and vulnerable in front of his eyes, because apparently, all he needed was a look to uncover Niall’s biggest secrets. He was intrigued._

_So, while he didn’t get the chance to see him in the case he was working on when they met, he jumped on the opportunity of seeing the great Sherlock Holmes in action the moment he got that call while they were having breakfast._

_Niall has been at war, worse than that, he has been an army doctor. He has seen the worst condition of the human body and has seen more pain than anyone can handle in a lifetime. Seeing the boy's body in that room reminded him of that and quiet surprised Lestrade that he didn’t react to it after Harry briefly introduced them. The truth is he wanted to puke, right there in front of everyone._

_His shoes were missing, his face was smashed, his fingertips were severely damaged, and blood was everywhere. The smell of it was strong as well, it was on the floor, the walls, and the bed where he was lying. Lestrade called the crime scene a “mess”, Harry called it “interesting”._

_Seeing him "in action" wasn't quite what he expected. He is quiet except when he tells people to move or not to touch certain things, but then he just observes and only talks to Lestrade. He only asked about the time of death and he did it looking at Niall who wasn't ready to be involved, thus it took him a couple of minutes to understand the fact that he was talking to him and to give him an answer._

_After that he didn’t need much. He knew who found him – not the name of the person but he knew it was in the morning after the party ended by the owner of the house –, he also knew that the kid was wealthy and he came with companion, not just one person but a group, maybe some friends from university, and he also knew they left the crime scene somewhere around two in the morning. When he was done he left the room, leaving Lestrade taking notes and Niall standing in the middle of it, wondering if he just made all of it up or he really just needed a few looks at the room to figure it out._

 

He knew things about Niall no one else could, like how he used only his first name and his last name when he was serving in the army instead of Niall because he thought he would be saving some part of himself he didn’t want to lose once he joined. He knew about his knees and how he used to play guitar by one glance at his nails. He knew about his brother’s alcoholism and how his wife left him just by looking at his phone and when he finally looked into his eyes, Niall felt like that man already knew everything that could be known about the Irish doctor and he felt exposed like never before.

Only then he asked him to call him Harry and meet at 221-B Baker Street.

“Mhmm,” the woman approaches him and the proximity of the dark green eyes makes Niall blink a couple of times until he can finally focus, “…and since yesterday you’ve moved in with him and now you’re solving crimes together.” Niall is starting to feel a bit dizzy. “Might we expect a happy announcement by the end of the week?”

_Who is this woman?_ “Who are you?” Niall asks again, louder this time.

"An interested party," she says this time, easily, like she has answered that question a hundred times before.

“Interested in Harry? Why?” Niall steps forward but she doesn’t move, just crosses her arms under her breast and looks up at Niall, directly into his eyes. “I’m guessing you’re not friends,” he says slowly as he evaluates her reaction.

She laughs again but this times it’s more genuine, like Niall actually said something funny.

“You’ve met him.” She smiles at him, tilting her head to the side, looking at him condescendingly. “How many friends do you imagine he has?”

It's not the first time he has heard that in such a short amount of time. Harry seems to be surrounded by all these different kind of people and they all seem to want something from him. They rely on him but at the same time, he seems so… _lonely_. There’s something in his eyes, the void of any kind of emotions in the way he talks that makes Niall think he was the one in the war instead of him.

And that just makes him wonder more and more about the green eyes and the curly brown hair. The little things that disconcert him that somehow are out of Harry’s character, like the hidden smiles he has caught every time he deducts something and turns out to be right or how his hands go soft in his pocket after he gets something he wants, or how childish he is in general but hides it behind a cunning look on his face or his haughty tone of voice when he explains something not everyone understands.

Everyone around him finds him annoying, but Niall, he finds him fascinating and kind of amusing.

“I’m the closest thing to a friend that _Sherlock Harrington Holmes_ is capable of having.” She interrupts his train of thought again and this time, Niall frowns.

“And what’s that?” Niall asks.

“An enemy.”

Niall freezes for a second to look into her eyes. She means it.

“An enemy?” he finds himself asking again and she nods.

“In his mind, certainly.” She uses the umbrella to support her weight again, stepping in the middle with her legs open and somehow, she looks even more intimidating than five seconds ago. "If you were to ask, he’d probably say his arch-enemy. He does love to be dramatic.” She laughs and for a second Niall thinks he sees fond in her eyes before the now familiar cold returns.

He does. Harry is quite dramatic which Niall can tell from the handful of times they have spent together so far. But now Niall is very confused. _Who has an arch-enemy? What do you have to do to even have an enemy?_

“And you don’t?” Niall asks looking at the empty space around them, trying to make a point. This whole charade, making public phones ring, moving surveillance cameras, black car picking him up in the middle of the street and an intimidating assistant that guides him into empty storage only to find a woman standing there with red lips and in a suit.

That’s a bit theatrical and Harry would love it. Niall can't help when the look on the woman's face breaks a little and she's about to say something but Niall's phone beeps and he takes it out of his pocket only to find a text from Harry.

_Baker Street. Come at once if convenient. –H._

Niall clears his throat as he thinks what could have come up since he left Harry with Detective Inspector Lestrade and how long he’s been back home already.

“I hope I’m not distracting you,” she says to make herself notable again and Niall is grateful for it because he really doesn’t have the time or the head to ask himself why he just referred to Baker Street as _home_.

“Not distracting me at all,” he answers as he puts his phone back into his pocket but he can't quite shut out his thoughts now. _Is Harry okay?_

“Do you plan to continue your association with Sherlock Holmes?” Her voice is growing numb as she starts losing Niall's attention but somehow, that sentences make him frown, looking at her from a new perspective, one that makes him feel threatened.

“I could be wrong… but I think that’s none of your business,” Niall replies with a smile trying to imitate her posture, using his stick to do the trick.

“It could be,” she answers, plainly.

"It really couldn't," Niall replies and he's not liking where this is going. He can easily step down and go back to Baker Street to find out what it is that Harry needs from him but that would give him no answers about what he's doing here and who this woman is.

“If you do move into, ehm,” she puts her hand into her jacket and pulls out a red velvet notebook only to open it and read from it, “221B Baker Street,” and Niall freezes.

It shouldn’t really surprise him. Someone with the power of controlling street surveillance cameras and payphones is completely capable of finding out Harry's address, but for some reason his heart starts beating faster and he can feel his hands getting sweaty. He needs to get back to the flat now.

“I could pay you a meaningful sum of money on a regular basis to ease your way,” she finishes, putting back the notebook where it was at the beginning.

“Why?” he asks, trying not to show how nervous he’s getting.

“Because you’re not a wealthy man,” she says and if Niall can hear the mockery, he ignores it.

“In exchange for what?” Niall reiterates, even if it’s not necessary, even if he already knows the answer.

“Information.” She has that smile again, as if that explains it all. “Nothing indiscreet. Nothing you’d feel… uncomfortable with. Just tell me what he’s up to.”

She sounds so casual, like she’s just asking Niall if he wants milk with his tea or not and Niall wonders if everything in the world of the one percent is that easy. She has money, anyone can tell. She has also power, Niall has seen it before, the way how those kind of people carry themselves. He has seen it in the army, he has seen it as a doctor and he can see it right now, in front of him with a raised eyebrow and red lips.

And now this woman is trying to use her money to do… what? Hurt Sherlock Holmes?

“Why?” He asks because he wants to know before he walks away.

“I worry about him. Constantly,” she says it so seriously; Niall almost believes her.

“That’s nice of you,”he laughs.

She ignores his jab and keeps talking. “But I would prefer for various reasons that my concern goes unmentioned. We have what you might call a difficult relationship.”

Niall doesn’t have the time to ask if they actually have some kind of relationship or if one of them is obsessed with the other one because that’s what it all looks like at this point. His phone vibrates again before he can even open his mouth and he takes it out of his.

_If inconvenient, come anyway. –H._

“No,” he finally answers, still looking at his phone and writing a quick reply.

“But I haven’t mentioned a figure,” she says slightly smirking with a mocking tone in her voice.

"Don't bother," Niall says putting his phone back into his pocket.

She looks at him then and crosses her arms. Niall has seen that look on her face before too. She thinks he's stupid, or too naïve, or something else that could make him weak or a liability. His brother had the same look on his face after Niall left his parents' house to enroll in the army, his general had the look on his face when he joined the field operations as a rescue doctor. At least, he proved one of them wrong.

But the thing is, he doesn’t need to prove anything to this woman. There’s a high possibility he won’t see her again and he’s okay with that. This whole thing has been too odd and he no longer thinks his life or Harry’s are in danger. At least for now. She can certainly do whatever she wants and get away with it, but there’s something in her eyes and in the way she talks that tells Niall that she wouldn’t actually hurt Harry.

Or maybe war hasn’t fucked him up as badly as he thought and he’s still seeing the best in people, especially the worst kind of people.

“You’re very loyal, very quickly.” She sounds surprised and Niall can already see the pity in her eyes and hear the incredulous tone on her voice. She thinks he’s too naïve, then.

“No, I’m not,” he replies, holding his walking stick even tighter in his fist, “I’m just not interested.”

She pulls out her little notebook and Niall has had enough so he turns around and starts walking, leaving whatever the hell this place is and trying to find out how to get to Baker Street.

“Trust issues…says here.” Her voice makes him stop and slowly turn back around.

There's a couple of notes on yellow paper that she took out of the notebook and which she's now holding in her other hand, and he recognizes those too well.

“What’s that?” he asks anyway, swallowing the lump in his throat.

“Could it be that you’ve decided to trust Sherlock Holmes of all people?” She frowns, putting the notes back into the notebook and the notebook into her pocket.

Niall doesn’t move from where he’s standing. The place seems to be even more empty than it was seconds before, if that's even possible. Maybe is the way her words seem to be echoing not only in his head but also resonate in his feet, like it hit the walls and fell into the floor. Somehow, she seems bigger from far away; here she's almost a blur of red and black and white. Niall is starting to think he is seeing things.

He doesn’t trust Harry, it’s not like that. He is just amazed by him and how he seems to know what he’s talking about, where he’s going and what to do in the darkest and creepiest scenarios Niall has seen in the city since he came back. And Niall just… follows him. He hears him talk and doesn’t get offended when Harry insults his _average_ intelligence. That’s all he has done so far and for some reason that has concerned a few people.

“Who says I trust him?” Niall says, leaning his head to the side, his eyes resting on where she keeps the small red velvet notebook.

“You don’t seem the kind to make friends easily.” It doesn’t sound like a question. She asks but it doesn’t sound like a question. She knows it which means she has investigated him too and in another lifetime she would be wrong, but Niall is not the same person he was eight years ago, he is barely a shell from that man.

“Are we done?” Niall clears his throat and put his hands into his coat pockets.

“You tell me.” She walks up to him and her steps resonate in the space, making Niall count the distance between them in steps until she stands in front of him, not that far apart, looking as intimidating as the first moment, just a few minutes ago, when Niall saw her in the middle of the room, standing alone with an umbrella and a red lips turning into a smile, “I imagine people have already warned you to stay away from him, but I can see from your left hand that’s not going to happen.”

“My what?” Niall frowns, making his fist tighter in his pocket.

“Show me.” She gets closer and Niall steps back.

“Don’t.” He stops her by putting the walking stick between them.

She raises her hands up to her chest and Niall takes a couple of seconds to calm his breathing before taking his hand out of his pocket and extending it to her.

"Remarkable." She gently touches his hand and looks intensely at his palm, his knuckles, and his bitten nails.

“What is?” he asks, taking his hand from her to put it in his pocket again.

"Most people… blunder around this city and all they see are streets and shops and cars.” She’s not looking at him anymore, she’s walking around with her eyes on the walls, the floor, the metal doors. “When you walk with Sherlock Holmes, you see a battlefield.” She turns to him then and points at him with her umbrella, “You’ve seen it already. Haven’t you, _Niall_?”

“What’s wrong with my hand?” he asks again because she seems to know what she’s talking about.

“You have an intermittent tremor in your right hand." Niall nods. He already knows that, his doctors told him that the second he came back, that's not news, but he waits until she's happy enough with the dramatic pause she’s doing as she stands in front of Niall, her face close to his but Niall doesn’t move. “Your therapist thinks its post-traumatic stress disorder.” Niall flinches and he hates the fact that she took him by surprise. “She thinks you’re haunted by memories of your military service.”

“Who the hell are you? How do you know that?” Now it’s him who gets closer but she evades him as easily.

“Fire her.” She smiles at him. “She’s got it the wrong way round. You’re under stress right now and your hand is perfectly steady. You’re not haunted by the war, Dr. Watson… You miss it.”

She walks past him to the door behind him, leaving Niall standing alone with his breathing getting faster and memories he’s trying to suppress crashing into him.

“Welcome back.” He hears her voice getting more and more distant. “Time to choose a side, Dr. Watson.” And then, the door closes.

*

When Niall finally returns to Baker Street, he finds Harry in a robe, lying on his back on top of the old stinky green couch with both hands over his lips and his eyes closed. Niall takes a look around the flat to see it in the same condition he left it in: stacks of paper over the desk against the windows, boxes of files scattered in the floor, and the strange aromas coming from the refrigerator.

Harry doesn’t look harmed or in pain and everything seems to be in its place.

“What’s the inconvenience?" Niall asks, getting out of the coat and hanging it on the coat rack next to the door.

“Can you hand me my notebook?” Harry replies without moving a muscle.

Niall frowns and looks around to see his rose gold laptop resting in the coffee table next to the couch. He could spread his arm and just take it.

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

Harry opens one eye only to see Niall standing in the middle of the living room with both hands on his hips, looking funny with the frown on his face, but his face is starting to get red so Harry closes his eye again until he feels a weight drop on top of his stomach, which briefly takes his breath away. That's going to leave a bruise. He takes his laptop from his abdomen and opens his eyes to access to his mail.

“You made me come here because you wanted me to pass you the stupid laptop? I thought you were in trouble! Or some kind of emergency came up!” Niall speaks loudly, not fully yelling but getting there.

Harry sits up slowly, really looking at Niall instead of the screen for the first time since the latter walked in. He’s been walking in the rain, somewhere outside the city by the mud on his shoes, maybe some abandoned warehouse or storage by the humidity of hair. Harry bites down his smile because he knows exactly what just happened to him.

"I told you to come if it wasn't inconvenient," Harry replies, calmly.

“And then you told me to come if it _was_ inconvenient, anyway!” He’s still mad but not as much as a couple of seconds ago, which is good.

"There's been a breakthrough in the case," Harry says with barely any interest in his tone, "They finally identified the body."

The look on Niall’s face changes completely. He turns to the sofa he has claimed as his as his and sits down to face Harry. "Well, that was fast," Niall says and Harry nods.

He takes his phone out of his pocket and sees a bunch of red notifications coming from the chat bubble with Lestrade’s name on it but he ignores it. If it’s urgent he’d send a mail, Lestrade knows that. Instead he opens the autopsy report to confirm what he already knew the moment he saw the faceless bloody mess in downtown.

“Dylan McKlein,” Harry says.

“McKlein?” Niall asks in disbelieve. “As in the guy that owns a bunch of Biogenetic Laboratories?”

Harry nods again, “More like the son.” He closes the laptop and leaves it on the coffee table to stand up and walk to his room the moment he gets Lestrade’s email asking him to come down to Scotland Yard.

“I met a woman today,” he hears Niall say from the living room, where he’s standing up from the armchair as well.

“Congratulations?” Harry asks, leaving his door open as he takes his black pants and a plaid shirt from his closet.

“Not like that.” Niall enters the room, taking a second to look at Harry changing clothes before clearing his throat. “She offered to pay me to spy on you.”

Harry laughs, putting the pants on and bottoming up the shirt. “Did you accept?”

“No…” Niall doubts, skeptical, offended even.

"Too bad. We could've used the money.” Harry passes him as he walks to the living room to get his coat. He opens the door but stops when he doesn’t hear steps rushing up behind him. “Lestrade need us at the Scotland Yard.”

“I’m wearing the same clothes as yesterday,” Niall offers as an explanation of his temporal inability of movement.

“It’s not my fault you’re too slow at moving in.” Harry takes Niall’s coat from the rack to walk to him and make him put it on arm by arm.

“I haven’t decided if i want to move in yet,” he says, making Harry stop to look him into his eyes.

“We both know you have.”

And with that, Harry disappears through the door frame and down the staircase. Niall follows behind, but not before swearing under his breath.

*

The place is upside down when they get there. Everyone is running from one side of the room to the other, phones are ringing, and they can see Liam in his office through the glass walls. He’s talking to what seems to be a married couple and their daughter. The man is screaming and Liam is trying to calm them down but it doesn’t look like it’s working. That’s the moment when Harry decides to make his way through the current chaos to get to Lestrade’s office.

And that’s the thing about Harry, it’s the way he moves into the masses, the way he walks with his hands in the pockets of his black coat and the collar up, always with that fake intense look in his eyes and the small smirk he thinks no one sees, the way he never greets anyone but is always aware of every person in the room, the way he provokes people only to get a reaction because he can see underneath the surface; he can tell when someone is lying or the moment they make a decision. Maybe that’s how he knew Niall wanted to move into Baker Street, even before he knew it himself, and somehow he’s okay with it.

When Niall sees the two women start crying and the man holding them both, he tries to grab Harry by the arm to stop him from going into the office because Liam obviously just told them the news about their son but unfortunately he’s not fast enough because Harry is already stepping into the office and he’s right there behind him.

Everyone looks up at them but Harry's expression doesn't change when he makes eye contact with the father, he only starts walking in the room, behind the desk until he stands in front of the big window facing the street. Niall stands awkwardly next to the door ready to leave this place once Harry is ready to go. When he’s done with his _thing_ where he stands in the corner of the rooms to look at people and make deductions only he could make, from facial expressions, tones of voice or even the condition of the clothes.

Niall’s brain can’t quite get it yet but he’s getting used to it.

Liam is explaining how they found their son's body in a room of the house where the party was taking place last night. The cause of death wasn't too hard to guess: several traumatisms to the head with a golf club, according to the autopsy. Lots of blood and no fingerprints, and interestingly enough not one of the over eighty guests on the first floor saw or heard anything. The time of death is somewhere around two and four in the morning. He was found by the owner of the house at six in the morning when he was going to sleep in his bedroom.

He was positioned in a fetal position, bruises on his arms and thighs and his black shirt was missing some buttons from the struggle. Niall examined him when he arrived with Harry that morning, his face was unrecognizable and his fingertips were cut in a half to make the process more difficult and from what Harry said, he wouldn’t have a criminal record to compare DNA, but apparently, he was wrong.

“…We were able to identify him by his hair; he was in the system,” Liam explains as he takes a file from his desk to read the charges.

“What?!” The man takes the file from his hands and starts reading it. “Drunk driving?”

That’s when the young woman starts crying harder, gaining her father’s attention.

“It was my fault,” she sobs. “About two months ago he called around three in the morning to get someone to pick him up from a police station but you were already sleeping so…" Her mother starts rubbing her back and she takes a couple of seconds to breathe, "I just went there and paid the bill, I didn't think about a record, I-"

“It’s okay,” Gregory McKlein says, throwing the file on the desk to kiss his daughter on the forehead instead.

Niall looks down because he feels like he’s intruding on something private, and he is. They shouldn’t be here, at least not now when these people look so vulnerable and in pain. Niall understands pain, he lives with it every day just like everyone else. Happiness is just stolen moments with the abstinence of pain. And maybe even Harry understands that because he starts walking to him, to the door and Niall is already turning his body to leave the office as well when he steps back and points at the daughter.

“When were you adopted?” Everyone goes silent and Niall can’t swallow suddenly.

And this is how the magic of Sherlock Holmes works. The world stops and the time slows down. Niall can see the change almost immediately: the air feels heavier and the breathing gets deeper. He can see the anger building up in people's eyes and knuckles being pressed so hard they turn white. That’s also one of many talents that he has discovered from Harry: he infuriates people, a lot. He makes them angry and scared so he always gets a response. But that’s a thin line and Niall is afraid one day he’s going to overstep it.

He wonders if Harry can hear the peoples' heartbeat just like he seems to actually be able to read minds. Maybe he can and maybe the sound of those thoughts is too loud that it makes him carry their pain too, making him the way he is. The father looks back at Harry and the mother slowly opens her mouth in shock. It feels like Harry just dropped a bomb in the middle of the room and everyone is waiting for it to explode. Niall only hopes for Harry to step back, but he already knows it won’t happen.

“What…?” she whispers and Harry steps closer to her.

“Not as a kid, obviously, you don’t feel completely comfortable around them…so, a teenager?” Harry is looking right in her eyes but the mother puts her arm around her so she steps back and the father stands in front of him instead. "You also have an assembly to the woman, is it… a brother? No, a sister. You’re her sister’s daughter, she’s your aunt.” He smiles, putting both hands in his pockets.

Niall walks in to grab Harry by the arm and out of the room, but he’s not moving.

“Excuse me?” The man yells trying to hold back the tears that are threatening to spill over. “Who are you?”

Harry stands up straight, slowly rising to his full height. He is as tall as the man in front of him and he has that petulant look on his face that Niall is starting to recognize. That’s when Liam steps in, making himself a barrier between the two of them.

“This is Sherlock Holmes and his colleague Dr. John Watson,” Liam clears his throat. “They’re consultants of the Scotland Yard.”

Niall knows this is Liam trying to save himself because ‘ _how else could two civilians be in the office of the Detective Inspector if they’re not related to a case?’_ He shouldn't be surprised by Lestrade's reaction but he is, especially because he doesn't feel really useful following Harry around and giving his opinion on things he doesn't really need an opinion for, plus they have medical examiners that could easily do a better job than Niall, but he wants to be selfish because he wants this job or whatever the hell it is that Harry does. He likes it, he likes the adrenaline running through his veins and the way his brain works under pressure and that he always has a response for anything Harry says and how important this is, even if Harry doesn't see it himself. 

He also doesn't miss the little smirk on Harry's face after Liam stands up for him or how he included Niall like they're some kind of package deal now. Niall can see it on his face when he turns to him for a quarter of a second.

_We both know you want this._

Niall is starting to hate those green eyes.

“I don’t want them anywhere near this investigation,” the man tells Liam, stabbing his finger on his chest.

Harry starts walking into the room again, with his eyes on the ceiling and his hands inside his pockets.

"But you do," Harry says behind McKlein as he looks at the women sitting on Liam's couch. "If you want to catch your son’s killer, I mean."

McKlein turns to him again. Niall can see the redness of his neck from where he’s standing. He’s furious.

“Do you have any idea who I am?” he says in disbelieve.

That’s when Harry laughs, loudly and rough. “I know you work with bacteria and you probably have the next epidemic, which can easily be used for a biologic attack, freezing under a hundred degrees celsius in one of your laboratories.” The man stands still, almost stepping back and blinking a couple of times. “Oh, you do.”

Harry puts the collar of his coat up and walks to the door.

"Send all the information regarding those projects." He turns to look at McKlein. "I mean all of it: from bank accounts to daily schedules. Don't make me have Watson hack into your services."

And then he walks out of the office, making Niall clear his throat and run after him to catch up.

“You are aware I don’t know how to hack, right?” Niall asks as Harry presses the button to call the lift.

“Of course I am,” Harry says when the lift doors open in front of them. “But he isn’t.”

Niall enters the lift the moment a smile appears on Harry’s face.

*

“Why do you never introduce yourself as Harry?”

They’re in the living room. Harry is reading the newspaper and Niall has been sitting in the chair for way too long now going through the boxes of files that McKlein sent over to Scotland Yard and writing down names and dates, not knowing exactly what it is Harry’s looking for.

He looks up, bending a piece of the paper to see Niall sitting in front of him. The light comes through the window and falls on Harry’s hair and Niall just remembers they haven’t had breakfast yet. He looks down at the paper in his lap only to not look at Harry right now. He has this lump in the middle of his throat every time Harry does this thing where he looks at him and stops doing whatever he is doing and everything on his face seems to stop moving as well.

And Niall doesn't understand it. He doesn't know why he feels this need of moving his hands to distract him from looking at his face or why his neck feels warmer or his feet start taping the floor or why his mouth feels dry and his heart starts beating a bit faster, so he ignores it.

“I don’t use that name very often.” He returns to his reading as if that heavy moment didn't even happen.

“Then, why did you ask me to call you that?” Niall doesn’t know where that question came from but now he needs to know the answer.

“I like how it sounds when you say it,” he says, turning to the next page and reading the title.

Niall goes quiet. He dares to look at him for just a second, at his profile illuminated but the light coming from the window, his fingers holding the paper and his crossed legs as he sits even further in the chair.

“Do you like an Irish accent?” Niall laughs, dropping one file to the floor and picking another one from the top of the box next to him.

"No," Harry answers, looking at him again. "I like yours."

Niall opens the mouth to say another joke that would make him stop feeling so conscious about himself or so aware of Harry’s presence so close to him when Ms. Hudson walks in holding a plate with two cups of tea, sugar, and milk, so he only clears his throat and stands up to help her clear the tea table next to Harry. He drops the bunch of files that he hasn’t touch yet to the floor next to his feet and put the mugs on the table as Ms. Hudson walks downstairs again.

Harry is a quiet person, the reflexive type. He stands or sits in one place for as long as he needs for his brain to navigate that giant web of his, connecting ideas and places and remembering dates or names as if time would wait for him. Niall’s a lucky person; he doesn't know Harry that well but he doubts there's anyone on this earth that confidently could say they know Sherlock Holmes. Niall highly doubts anyone else knows he's also named Harry.

Then, why _him_? Why would Harry tell him these parts of his life? Why does he feel so strange around him but Harry seems so unbothered? Why does Niall feel like that he can see the man behind the façade he portraits? They haven't spent much time together, they haven’t even talked a lot but somehow Niall knows exactly what Harry means by a look or a single phrase, and it’s funny because Niall has met a lot of people in the course of his life, but hasn't understood anyone the way he _gets_ Harry.

So, when Niall sees he's taking too long reading just one page, he turns to look at the files next to his feet and he realizes it's already ten in the morning and Harry's still in his silky pajamas.

“Why haven’t you picked up a single box since Lestrade came to drop these?” Niall asks, putting sugar and milk in his cup of tea.

“Because the answer is not in any of those boxes," Harry answers, finally turning the page. Niall points at the sugar and he shakes his head, so he takes his cup and walks to the chair to sit.

“What do you mean?” Niall takes a sip, it’s still a bit hot but it’s good enough for Niall to put up with.

“He wasn’t killed because of some bacteria.” Harry finally gives up with the newspaper and throws it somewhere behind him, “He was killed by revenge, poetic justice, call it whatever you want.” He stands up and stretches in front of the chimney.

“Anyone of these people could’ve wanted revenge,” Niall says, as he walks up to Harry. He leaves his unfinished cup on the top of the chimney to pick up a file he left in the important pile at his right. “Fired scientists, accountants, even his partner,” Niall notes, handing him the file.

"He wasn't killed because of his father," Harry responds, ignoring Niall completely as he starts walking into the room. Niall follows his movements with his eyes.

“Then, why did you ask for all of this?” he asks when Harry finally stops in front of that yellow smiley face drawn in the wall with three bullet holes in it.

Harry gets bored easily.

“To distract them,” he answers as he turns to face Niall, using that condescending tone of his, as if that was a well-known fact by everyone. “False sense of security,” he explains, after looking at Niall for a bit too long.

_Distract them from what? Finding the real killer of their son? Why would Harry want that, if not -?_

“You think his father did it?” Niall says, slowly approaching Harry and standing next to him in front of the wall.

It's empty now but Niall doubts that will be its state for too long. When he first got in the flat the wall was covered in pictures, newspaper and web articles, and they were connected by red threads going from one side of the wall to the other. Harry was in the middle of solving this huge case that took him a week, he barely ate or slept according to Ms. Hudson and Niall only came at the end of it, he wasn't of much help even if Harry told him his _"contributions were quite fruitful"_.

“No.” He touches his chin as if he’s thinking about how to put out another criminal collage on his wall.

“Then who?” Niall asks turning his body to look at Harry’s profile.

“I don’t know yet,” he answers as if it wasn't a big deal like they ran out of milk and he has to go and get some eventually.

Niall wishes he wouldn’t have to look at Harry in disbelief that often, but he does because Harry doesn’t tell him what’s on his mind at any moment. He just tells him what he wants him to do or say when it’s necessary, and apparently this wasn’t one of those times.

"Wait," Niall says looking around him to the pile of unopened boxes and the already read files near his chair that he spent all day yesterday going through. "Why did I go through those boxes if there's nothing of value there?!"

"I didn't ask you to do that," Harry answers, looking at Niall as if he lost his mind. "You picked them up and started reading the files."

“Why didn’t you tell me to stop?” he asks again, trying to remain calm and not think about the zero sleep he got last night.

“Why would I do that?” Harry looks at him in bewilderment. “We’re waiting for Lestrade to call me about the friends anyway.” Weirdly enough, Harry’s phone rings right before Niall can ask for an explanation. Harry answers his phone, nods a couple of times and then he goes to his room to change. The next thing he knows, Harry is throwing him his coat and they're stepping out of Baker Street.

*

There are five kids sitting outside Lestrade's office when they get to Scotland Yard. They're young, around the age of the deceased and they seem to be scared. Niall has seen a lot of scared people in the last few years, he has seen the terror in faces and has heard the tears in someone's voice. These three women and two young men are a perfect example: two of the girls are crying but every single one of them seems to be trembling. They're looking at the lights above their heads, the floor, the rest of the officers, anything but each other.

Harry walks pass them not giving them a second look as he enters Liam’s office. He’s standing next to his desk and talking to someone on the phone when they step in. He points to the couch when he sees them and Niall goes to sit down but Harry stands right in front of Liam, separated only by the desk between them, and waits.

 “Are they confessing?” Niall asks when Liam hangs up.

"No, but their lawyers are on their way, so if we want a confession we have to act fast," Liam says, looking outside his office and making eye contact with one of his officers, nodding at the interrogation room.

“You won’t get a confession,” Harry laughs, “Don’t be ridiculous, Lestrade.”

The officer approaches the kids sitting outside the office and guides them to the interrogation room.

“What do you mean?” Liam asks, checking his phone one last time but Harry doesn’t answer. Liam seems to be used to it because he just sighs before stepping out of the office with Harry and Niall walking behind him.

*

“So, let me get this straight…” Liam says slowly, “You found the body, got scared, left the party and burned your clothes with his blood on it and possibly evidence?”

The girl starts crying again, hysterically. Liam is really trying to conduct the interrogation to get something helpful but he’s getting nowhere. Harry and Niall are watching from a different, smaller room which is separated from the interrogation room through a one-way mirror.

The shaky blonde girl in front of them is called Shelly and she is the girlfriend of the deceased. Liam decided to interview every single one of them by himself, so the rest of the group is waiting outside. The girl was the first to find the body but she didn’t call an ambulance and if Niall has to be honest, he doesn’t understand why she would come here and incriminate herself. Eventually Harry would’ve found out about it, he already knew about some “friends” but the girl in front of them makes no sense.

She found the body, got covered in blood and stayed in the bedroom until her friends found her holding the deceased’s body and they all fled the scene without leaving any trace? And without being seen? Something is off and Niall can see Harry thinks the same by the way he frowns as he looks through the window. Maybe he’s trying to catch something in Shelly’s eyes, her trembling hands or her swallowing throat. Niall doesn’t know, the only thing he knows is that Harry is up to something.

“We had a fight earlier that day,” she says and it’s already looking bad for her. “He was supposed to pick me up from the dorms to go to the party but since we don’t talk when we fight I went on my own.” She breathes in a couple of times and Liam writes something down in his little notebook.

She takes a sip from the glass of water on the table. Her hands are not trembling like before but her face is still red from the crying and her blond hair is all over the place. Her eyes look like they were injected with some kind of substance and Niall almost feels sorry for her. She starts looking around her and Liam lets her for just a minute before clearing up his throat but it almost seems like it’s not necessary since she already has an answer on the tip her tongue.

“I saw him a couple of times on the party but I wanted him to come to me,” she’s looking at the door frame with lost eyes and an empty expression, “he never did, so when I saw he was going upstairs I thought he was going to screw some girl and I followed him. I lost him for a minute but when I finally found him, he-,” her eyes start watering again and Liam nods.

Liam pulls out the photos from the crime scene from the file over the table and puts them in front of her. She gasps and touches the picture with the body of Dylan McKlein.

“That’s how you found him?” Liam asks, as he buys her _testimony_.

She looks at Liam, confused and then she looks at the pictures again, pulling them closer to her and putting it in some kind of order as if she was drawing the room. Niall can’t see exactly what it is she’s doing from that side of the room but he can see her shaking her head.

“I never turned the lights on but he was lying on the bed,” she says, picking up two photographs. “he was lying on his stomach and I turned him over,” she sighs, “then I saw his face-,”

She sounds hurt but it’s not like in the beginning of the interrogation. She sounds concerned and methodic now and the tone of her voice is delicate as if her throat is sore but Niall can see it in her eyes now, he can see it in the way her fingers move all over the pictures trying to give one bit of sense of everything that’s going on, she wants to talk.

“The bedsheets-,” she puts the imagine of the empty and clean bed over the table and looks at it, in shock. “It was all covered in blood, I don’t-”

“Why didn’t you call an ambulance? The police?” Liam asks, taking the pictures from her hands.

She puts her head in her hands, her eyes still glued to the table where the pictures were a second ago. “I was scared, and then Oliver-,”

“Don’t say another word!” In that exact moment the door opens and everyone inside looks up to find a woman in a gray suit holding a briefcase. “I’m her lawyer,” she says looking at Shelly. “And you’re conducting a witness declaration in an interrogation room, detective inspector Lestrade.”

*

The wall is covered again. Photographs of the five friends in strategic points with their names on top top of their faces and Harry’s standing in front of it, looking for answers as the video of their interrogations play behind him on his laptop as a background noise. It’s been almost twenty hours since they’ve been in the flat after Lestrade’s call and neither of them have eaten, slept or showered.

Niall is tired and his vision is starting to get blurry every time he looks up to see the same five photos of the same five faces they have seen for twenty hours. He just wants to go to bed and call it a day but Harry hasn’t moved in two hours and Niall is worried he’s going to spend what’s left of the day in the same spot. So he stands up from the chair and walks up to Harry until he’s standing next to him.

“Isn’t it fascinating, Niall?” His voice is so filled up with emotion and it makes Niall slowly turn to see his face.

He’s smiling so big, just like a kid on Christmas morning about to open a pile of presents. His hands are in the pockets of his pants and he’s bouncing on his toes like he has pure excitement running though his veins.

“The board has never been so empty and yet so full of possibilities,” he says, his eyes going from one photo to the other.

“You do realize that it’s actually a wall, right?” Niall prefers to distract himself from the fact that Harry seems quite pleased at the moment. “It’s the main wall in our living room,” Niall repeats himself, turning his body entirely to face Harry, catching the way the smile on his face changes at his words.

“ _Our_ living room?” Harry asks, softly and for a second he looks like a normal thirty-something year old man wearing a robe in the morning, making Niall speechless.

“Why are you so surprised?” Niall says looking at the wall and ignoring the red of his own cheeks and the overwhelming feeling of Harry’s eyes on his face. “I already accepted living here.”

Harry laughs for what seems like the first time since Niall has met him. The sound is deep, coming from the back of his throat and released to the world in a light way, it’s captivating and that scares the shit out of Niall because he has never felt this way for a man before. He’s not stupid, he can recognize the itch on the tip of his fingers or the warm behind his neck, he’s familiar with the numb noise of his ears every time he talks or walks in the room, he has felt it before, but never for someone like Harry.

He doesn’t know what to do with this new information so he walks to the kitchen even though he knows there’s nothing that he could eat as breakfast, or any kind of meal if he has to be honest. Niall can hear Harry in the living room behind him, moving from one side to the other and talking to himself louder than he actually thinks.

It’s not the first time these kind of thoughts appeared on his mind, but that’s all they were, _thoughts_. It’s different now, the way he feels about Harry is just a confirmation of what he’s been knowing for a long time, and it feels great, it’s terrifying but it’s good. Liberating in some way. So when Niall comes back to the living room with two cups of tea he can’t help but smile at him.

“Why do you look so pleased?” Harry asks when he receives the cup of tea. “It’s like you already know where we’re going next.”

Niall laughs as he sits in the chair next to Harry’s and takes a sip. “Well, I don’t.”

“But I do,” Harry replies, lifting on eyebrow as he drinks the tea.

*

“Why are we here again?” Niall asks as he crawls down following Harry.

There are guards behind the building so he understands the need to not be seen. What he doesn’t understand on the other hand is why Harry had to wait till it was midnight to come to the university campus or why he didn’t just talk to Liam and ask for a warrant. Harry stands up facing the Dean’s office window, takes something from his pocket and forces the bolt until it finally opens. He looks around and steps in.

“Harry!” Niall whispers but he’s already inside, his flashlight pointing to different sections of the room, catching glances of everything.

Niall gives up and enters the room to find Harry sitting at the desk, turning the computer on.

“What are you doing?” He approaches, but Harry doesn’t answer, his eyes flicking across the screen and his fingers clicking non-stop are enough for Niall to know where his attention is.

Niall walks up to him to catch a look at the screen. For someone who understands so much about the world and interactions and deductions, Harry seems so oblivious to the simplest things.

“It needs a password, Harry,” Niall whispers into his ear, looking at the door in front of them, feeling that someone could find them at any second.

“A password, of course!” Harry whispers back and hands him the flashlight. “Show me the office.”

It takes him a second to understand what he needs but when he finally gets it he starts to point the flashlight to different parts of the room for Harry to see. After a couple of glances Harry sits down and writes a password. Niall doesn’t even ask when he guesses it right.

Niall sees him looking at the desktop, opening file after file until he finds, apparently, what he’s been looking for: Student Records.

“You are aware that Liam has the friends’ records, right?” he says to Harry when he sees him type the names only to find the same faces they have hanging on their wall.

“Not the ones I want,” Harry answers, printing page after page and making Niall more anxious than he ever thought he could be. And he’s been in war.

“Their first year? Why would you want the record of their first year?” Niall asks, confused.

But Harry can’t answer because he only has time to turn the monitor off and drag Niall under the desk when the door opens. Harry is calm, Niall can see it in his face just a couple of inches apart from his as he tries to control his own breathing. They’re close, too close to be comfortable but the guard is still in the room and his flashlight is searching the office.

Niall can feel Harry breathing on his neck and his hand on his waist keeping him from moving and for once, Niall is pretty grateful for the fact that he was so scared he closed the window after stepping into the office. It’s pretty quiet apart from the guard’s steps as he wanders through the room but Niall can swear the three of them can hear his heartbeat, going faster and faster, especially when Harry starts moving, like he’s trying to stand up. Niall takes his wrist to stop him the exact moment the guard closes the door.

Harry takes the pages and turns the computer off before taking Niall’s hand in his and leaving the Dean’s office.

*

It’s been two days and Liam’s stressed. Niall can understand the reason why. He has father come in every single day, yell at him, throw a few things at the wall, call him inept and then he leaves. That’s not a good environment for any kind of progress, especially if Liam’s board looks even close to as messy as Harry’s wall. The same photos, the same red string and the same interrogation points over faces, places, times and names.

The friends are not saying anything different from their first deposition. The same words and emotions on their faces as they recite the facts over and over again: The girlfriend, Shelly Reagan, found the body at around two in morning, and somehow, managed to not scream or move until Oliver Allister casually walked into the same room and found her holding Dylan’s head in her lap and then he contacted Isaac O’connor and Nina Maccioli, who finally called Audrey Scallo. Anc they did all of that without calling any attention to them. It’s almost like it was rehearsed, but the expression on their eyes when they tell it, when the explain the same details over and over again is not, Niall can see it through the glass, they’re in pain, they’re hurt and they all loved Dylan in their own way.

“Someone is here for the McKlein case, Sir.” A head pops into the office, making Liam turn to the detective’s voice. “A girl saying she’s been seeing Dylan for over three months.”

“He was cheating on her!” Liam immediately stand up and runs to the board with a red marker and circles the girlfriend’s face and connects it to the crime scene. “Everything about the crime scene… it was personal.” His eyes are shining with excitement, feeling like the case is finally being solved.

Liam’s whispering to himself before he picks up a file and follows the detective to the interrogation room. The room is left in silence, no one else moving, just the sound of breathing and maybe Harry’s brain doing his thing if Niall focuses enough. The thing is, he hasn’t said a word since they came into the office and Niall is a bit worried if he has to be honest. He doesn’t know what to expect when it comes to Harry, he never knows what’s he’s going to do or what he’s thinking of, let alone the reason for anything he does. He’s getting used to it, yes, but the feeling that he has to be alert and ready for anything at all times, that stills pretty fresh in the back of his head.

Niall is ready to go after Lestrade and the other detective when he notices Harry’s still sitting on the couch with no intentions of moving, which he finds odd. Harry is not the calm, sitting-in-one-spot kind of guy, not when he has a case between his fingers. But seeing him in that moment...it almost seems like he’s resting, sleeping with his eyes open even.

He hasn’t say much after they came back from the dean’s office and he hasn’t told him about the importance of the records he printed either. It’s not hanging on the wall or written down on notes connecting the dots. It’s just sitting over there on a table, almost like it’s mocking them.

“You don’t want to hear the interrogation?” Niall asks, surprised after hearing nothing but silence from Harry.

“Oh no, Liam is right, he was cheating on her,” he answers, absolutely calm, crossing his legs and placing his hands over his knees. “The girl wasn’t wearing the gold necklace she owns in several pictures shared on social media accounts from the night of the murder. At first I thought she lost it in when she found the body, but apparently she wasn’t wearing it for over two months at that point. She also didn’t dye her hair or get a manicure lately. She doesn’t look like someone who would be that negligent about herself, except when she didn’t see a point to it or even forgot about it because something else was occupying her mind.”

“You knew?” Niall asks in shock. “And you didn’t say anything?”

Is this the reason why they went to the university in the middle of the night? How did he find out? Niall has noticed, he’s not dumb, that Liam technically gives Harry everything that he wants or needs for the investigation. He’s also witnessed him ignore Harry’s insults and disobedience, and the only reason Niall guesses he allows it is because there’s no one else who can do what Harry can.

But keeping this kind of information from him? He’s not that sure anymore Harry deserves Liam’s trust.

“Lestrade doesn’t like my deductions without hard proof,” Harry answers as if he heard Niall’s thoughts. “I prefer to save my patience to explain simple things for you only.”

And there it is, the sarcasm and the satire on his voice, like he physically needs to remind everyone, everywhere that he is the smartest person in the room. 

“Liam is not gonna like this,” Niall says, choosing to ignore Harry’s previous comment.

“Who?” Harry asks, genuinely confused by the expression on his face.

Niall stops to look Harry directly in the eyes, trying to ask questions he doesn’t want Harry to answer out loud.

“Liam?” Niall says in return, pointing at the door where Liam’s name is written. “Lestrade?”

“Don’t you mean Leonard?” Harry answers.

“I can’t tell if you’re joking or not.”

Harry shrugs and Niall opens his mouth to call him out but by the way he turns his entire body to face the whiteboard again he realizes it may not even matter. If Harry hasn’t learned his name after all those years, how would Niall be able to change that? It’s not that Niall doesn’t think Harry can change or improve, it just seems that no one around him has actual faith in it.

Niall sees Liam walking out of the interrogation room with a pleased expression on his face, looking like he just solved the entire case.

“The girlfriend didn’t do it.”

It’s the first thing Harry says the moment Liam steps into the office, slowly erasing the smile he just had on his face but the moment of sadness is replaced with an expression that Niall’s grown used to seeing on Liam’s face when Harry is involved: tiredness.

“Not right now, Holmes. I have a solid case.” Liam walks pass Harry to his desk and sits, leaving the file in front of him.

“You are better than that, Lestrade,” Harry says, approaching Liam from the other side of the office. “Some random girl saying she had kind of a relationship with McKlein wouldn’t be enough for you to consider a crime of passion.” He rests both of his hands on top of the desk in front of Liam.

Liam leans back, putting his hand on the back of his head and letting all the air inside his lungs out. He truly looks tired and Niall assumes Harry has a lot to do with it.

“How do you explain the letter, then?” Liam asks.

Harry steps backs like he’s counting his steps, slowly and carefully. His hands are somehow still in front of him but now they’re just floating in the air. It’d almost be comical, the way he looks right now, if it wasn’t for the expression on his face, one Niall hasn’t seen before and, going by his reaction, Liam hasn’t either.

“A letter?” He sounds surprised. “What letter?” Harry didn’t see that coming.

*

“She said she found it this morning under her door at the dorms,” Liam says looking at the letter over Harry’s shoulder.

Harry has the protocoled gloves on his hands as he examines the letter. It’s a white and thick paper that’s used for formal letters or invitations. It was written on a typewriter and is dated from three years ago. it doesn’t say much but the message is clear and scared its recipient enough to come through.

_May, 2016:_

_Go to the police. Tell them about Dylan._

_-S._

The lab is quiet, mainly due to Harry yelling at the scientists earlier who were working on the small piece of paper before he could get his hands on it. After twenty-five minutes, he had three conclusions.

_One._

This comes from someone who knew about the relationship between Jessica Stanley and Dylan McKlein. Someone other than his girlfriend, which Harry is certain about. This person managed to get the note to Jessica without being noticed. They know Jessica’s schedule and location of her dorm room. They also waited a couple of days, maybe realizing Jessica wasn’t going to come out with the truth by herself.

_Two._

They didn’t just leave a letter. There was something else attached to the letter according to the light marks left on the back of the paper once the envelope was held against a light source. Harry believes Jessica took it and kept it. Harry also thinks he needs to see it.

_And three._

The paper is from 2016. The letter isn’t just dated as 2016 but it was also written three years before the crime actually happened and it was kept to be send just now.

“How could you possibly know that?” Niall questions, putting his hands in his coat pockets trying to battle the cold wind of London.

They left the lab and the station after Harry announced his three conclusions and then walked out of the room without saying anything else to Liam, just waiting for Niall to follow him to start talking. Niall could still hear Liam calling for their names, asking about the conclusions.

“There’s a recognized printing company in downtown London called ‘The House of Caxton’.” Harry stands at the edge of the street with an extended arm, waving his hand to stop a taxi. “They celebrated their 100th anniversary in 2016 by selling a very limited edition of a certain presentation-card type of paper,”

A black cab stops in front of them and Harry opens the door for Niall. He stands still for a couple a second, looking at Harry without knowing exactly how to react so he just laughs and gets in the car, watching Harry do the same until he’s finally sitting next to him.

“So, let me guess,” Niall says, trying to imitate his voice and the tone he always uses when he’s making deductions, like it should be obvious for everyone. “That letter’s paper is part of that package,” he says as he hears the car’s door closing.

“It was in the market for only three months.” Harry looks Niall directly in the eyes, looking directly at his eyes, but he’s not only explaining him a fact, he’s sharing information.

And that’s when it hits him.

Harry trusts him. Definitely more than he trusts Liam or any other detective. He thinks of Niall as an equal, even if he won’t ever admit it. Harry Holmes, this impossible man and unapproachable human sees Niall Watson as a peer even though he’s only known him for a few days. He nods his head at him, almost like reassuring him about his new discoveries, then he turns his head to the driver.

“To Caxton’s printing, please.”

*

Coming back to Baker Street after their failure at the printer was irritating Harry terribly. Niall knows he’s an incredibly smart man, Harry understands the world in a way Niall has never witnessed before, he sees people and streets and interactions as maps and clues, he sees the world as an empty space that only needs his senses to be filled and solved, but when it comes to basic facts like memory cards, Harry can be a little dense.

“How could they not keep the footage?!”

Harry waits till Niall opens the door to storm in, fighting his way out of the coat to hang it in the hallway and then stalk the stairs upstairs.

“It’s been three years, Harry. They delete everything every six months.”

“That makes no sense!” Harry flops down on the couch and covers his face with his hands.

Niall closes the door behind him and sits in the chair next to him. Now is his turn to be patient, to explain things to Harry.

“I just don’t understand why you’re so upset.” Harry takes his hands off his face to look at him. “. “The chances of us finding the person who bought the package were really low. It could’ve been a gift or something they found and decided to use to throw the police off. We don’t even know if the letter it’s from the killer…”

He was still talking but it takes Harry just one second to stand up and grab Niall’s face on both hands, pulling their faces dangerously close, almost breathing over his lips and then he whispers.

“Oh, but it is, Niall,” he whispers urgently. “It is from them.” He smiles and takes the hair out of Niall’s eyes, slowly, gently and Niall wonders if he’s going to kiss his forehead. “They’re smart. They have planned this for a long time.”

But he doesn’t. He doesn’t kiss Niall or stay like that for another second. Instead, he lets his face go and walks to his room with a red face, leaving Niall and his traitorous heart all alone.

*

The music is loud, the lights bright, and the heat almost unbearable. The place is crowded and they were standing in the entrance, not really sure if they should go in. Niall doesn’t know if he should be here, he hasn’t spoken to his therapist about coming to places like this yet, but to be honest, he hasn’t spoken to his therapist since he met that woman. The flashes and the sounds are making him uncomfortable, like something is crawling down his skin and he’s just getting ready to be jumped.

When Harry said they were going out that night, he never imagined a gay bar. It’s not like he has never been to one before, he just didn’t think Harry has. But then again, Harry doesn’t really talk about his personal life or his preferences, the way he spends his free time.

“Um, Harry?” But he’s already walking into the bar, avoiding to bump into people like an expert, fast and focuses like he has a goal. Niall has no other option but to follow him. When he finally catches up, he sees something he never thought he’d see: Harry, laughing, and charming the bartender, with wrinkles around his eyes and that beautiful big smile on display. He can even see his front teeth.

“Oh, here he is.” Harry smiles at him when Niall arrives and, to Niall’s further surprise, takes his hand on his. “This is Nate, my boyfriend.”

Niall is positive that if he had a drink in his hand, the glass would have hit the floor the moment Harry said those words.

“We’ve been spending some time in Ireland with Nate’s family but we’re finally back home,” Harry laughs and the bartender smile at them, touching both of their arms.

“So everything went okay?” He asks like he’s an old friend of them and Niall has never been more confused.

“Of course! They loved me,” Harry says, looking at Niall. “Didn’t they, pet?”

“Yeah…” Niall says, exhaling the words as he looks deep into Harry’s green eyes. “How could you not love this face?” He finally relaxes and takes Harry’s chin between his finger to shake his face softly.

They share an intense moment of eye contact before Harry clears his throat and turns back to the bartender. “We’ve been trying to get in touch with our friend?” Harry says, recovering from the awkward silence. “Isaac and Dylan? They always tell us about this place.”

Niall tries to maintain a blank face but he’s as surprises as the bartender at Harry’s words.

“I didn’t know they have friends who knew about them,” the man in front of them whispers.

“Not many do.” Harry smiles, intertwining their hands before putting them hands on top of the bar. “But we haven’t talked in a few months and we miss them.” 

“The last thing I know is that they had a huge fight.” The bartender leans over the bar, closer to them to talk lower, like the music in the place wouldn’t keep people from hearing their conversation. “Apparently, Dylan’s girlfriend was getting suspicious about him cheating.”

“Oh, no.” Harry says. “Maybe we’ll go see them at Isaac’s dorm.”

“Wait,” he says, standing up again and growing a few inches. “Why don’t you try calling them?”

“That’s a fantastic idea…” Harry smiles back at him and points to the name written on the label on his chest. “Brian. Thank you.”

He doesn’t have time to reply because Harry is taking them both out of there, dragging Niall through the dance floor and pushing people away. Niall starts to get out of breath and really feel the lack of space and the amount of people around them. He’s not feeling good but it’s almost like Harry knows by the way he’s walking.

It’s when they stand outside the club when Harry lets Niall’s hand go to let him breathe. His head is palpitating and his hand is on his chest, to help him calm down. Niall can see Harry’s shoes in front of him and he wonders if he thinks Niall’s weak. A claustrophobic boy joining the army. But when he feels his hand rubbing his back, he knows he doesn’t.

“Breathe.” he hears him say into his ear, and he does. Slowly and calm as he feels the air cold on his cheeks and the warmth of Harry’s hand on this back.

Harry straightens him up and turns him into the lights of the club’s sign to have a better look at his face.

“Are you alright?” Harry asks, returning to his usual tone of voice. His face is void of the smile from earlier and the spark in his eyes. He looks worried.

“How did you know?” Niall asks instead, starting to breathe normally again.

“I knew the moment you walked into 221 B, looking at the windows and the doors. Counting your steps from one room to the other.” He sounds like the mere question offends him. And maybe Niall should’ve known that before.

“And yet, you brought me here,” Niall says, turning his face to the side.

“I needed you.” Harry’s hands are still over his shoulder and his voice is still tender, like he’s afraid Niall’s going to break any second now.

They look at each other, even when Niall tells himself he’s looking at the wall behind Harry and Harry is just looking at the cars passing by or the people walking to the bar. Would it matter to him? If someone sees them there? He doesn’t seem to be the person who cares about what other people say, but somehow this seems different. It’s too personal.

“So…” Niall says, kicking the little rocks by his feet. “Dylan was gay.”

Harry shakes his head, without taking his hands off Niall as if they’re used to have this kind of conversations. “Isaac is. Dylan just comes here with him. I just need to know why.”

Harry catches something behind Niall and he is about to turn his head when Harry’s hands come up to hold his face straight. Harry’s grip tightens as he gets closer, looking Niall straight in the eyes.

“I want you to know I’m doing this because it’s entirely necessary,” Harry says, slowly pushing Niall against the wall to their left.

“I understand, Harry,” Niall says, getting slightly more and more confused.

“It’s what the situation demands. I’m being professional. We’re working right now.” And that’s when Harry stops making sense.

“What?” Niall whispers but the sound is robbed from his lips.

Harry is not being professional; this is not professional. The way he’s kissing him is not the way you kiss a co-worker. The way he has Niall trapped between the wall and his body, almost covering him entirely. The way his hands move from his back to his sides. The way his lips feel on his. Nothing about this is professional. It’s rough and fast. He can feel the tip of his nose on his cheek and his fingertips on the back of his neck, so he does the only thing he can do in this moment. He kisses him back.

He grabs the flaps of his coat and pulls him closer. He has kissed a good amount of girls before, but he has never felt this way and it’s overwhelming. Harry’s body is touching his from knees to chest, his cheeks feel red and hot and his hands seem to be useless right now. And when he opens his mouth and Harry makes that _sound_ , Niall regrets every second they wasted not kissing each other since he walked into that apartment on Baker Street.

Niall doesn’t know how they kiss last after that, but it’s not enough. Harry is breathing heavily against his cheek, his forehead resting against his, and his hand extended on the wall next to his head. Niall has his hands on his hips and he’s trying to bite down the smile growing on his face.

“Isaac,” he whispers on his ear.

“What?” Niall turns his head just a little to catch a glance at Harry’s profile. His lips are open and more red than they regularly are, his eyes are closed and the hand on his waist is not gone.

“He was walking into the club,” he explains and Niall’s hand drop to his sides. “He saw us in Liam’s office. I didn’t-”

“Yeah, yeah.” Niall nods, stepping aside and leaving Harry in the same position he was just a couple of seconds before but now Niall is not between him and the wall anymore. “I remember.” Niall clears his throat. “We should get going.”

*

The Lestrade’s case is going nowhere. Liam tried to charge Shelly but she got a good lawyer who’s slowly breaking Liam’s theory down, exactly how Harry predicted she would. Dylan’s sister went twice more into the station to testify but they found nothing other than circumstantial evidence against the girlfriend and the rest of the friends. On the other hand, Harry’s been busy. Not only trying to avoid Niall but taking everything from his wall, only leaving a single red line pointing to their door.

Niall is standing behind Harry, looking at the empty wall and drinking his morning tea. He has been rejected a couple of times before and he has learned to make peace with the numb feeling in the middle of his chest, even if he has to live with the reason his ears go red and his pulse quickens every time he sees him. Harry’s been trying to keep the conversation level at minimum, which is difficult to him when he has all these ideas he wants to share and be praised for, so Niall laughs every time he struggles and listens like the good friend he knows he is.

It was just a kiss. It doesn’t matter how much it changed him. Harry doesn’t feel the same way, he’s a grown man, he can deal with that.

He’s now putting up the photos of the friends again, but this time one by one, some pictures next to the other two letters that were sent a few weeks ago to Liam’s office.

The situation was perfect for Harry. He had an excuse to spend entire days in the lab only to examined the letter, finding no DNA or anything that could be helpful in any way to find the killer. Harry is getting frustrated, not only because of the letter but, apparently, all of them, the five friends, had a reason to kill Dylan McKlein. His entire life was falling apart the last two weeks before his murder: Shelly found out about his affair, he didn’t get the money he promised to Oliver for his mum’s surgery, he took Nina’s opportunity of having her dream job thanks to his father’s connections, he threatened to expose Isaac sexuality to the football team and his family and he almost destroyed Audrey’s career.

All problems which were all solved after he died.

“Is it a timeline?” Niall asks, finishing his toast and taking the last sip of his tea.

Harry nods while hanging more papers on the wall until he gets to the day of the murder.

“That’s why you needed the student records,” he says, more to himself than to Harry. “Is that the time each one of them met Dylan?” Niall points at the pictures in order and Harry nods again.

“There’s something I’m not seeing.” Harry backs up and stands next to Niall and that’s the closer they’ve been in three weeks.

“Like a hidden message?” Niall asks and Harry once more. “Something like the dates in the letters or how it’s always signed with a different initial?”

Everything stops until it all starts working again. Harry’s eyes open wide and he runs to the desk for a paper and a pen.

“The names and the dates,” Harry says, frantically writing on the paper. “How couldn’t I see it before?!” he takes a red marker and circles the first letter of every name: Shelly, Oliver, Nina, Isaac and Audrey, according to Harry’s timeline.

He throws away the red marker and find a blue one and then, he does the same thing with the last names.

When he’s done, one name is written in Harry’s paper.

_Sonia Morales._

Every initial of every name and every initial of every last name lined up in front of them.

“Sonia Morales?” Niall repeats. “Is that a suspect?”

“I’ve heard that name before.”

Harry freezes for a second, thinking. The next thing he does is smile, so big it brings Niall back to the day at the bar, just like the kiss Harry plants on his lips before he’s disappearing through the door.

“You are a genius, Niall!” He can hear Harry’s reached the bottom floor already as he’s still frozen on the same spot Harry kissed him a few moments ago. “Call Lestrade! Tell him we solved the case!”

The door opens and the noise of London invades their apartment.

“Tell him we will be needing a helicopter, too!” Harry says and Niall can almost hear him smile, “The game is on.” And then, he closes the door.

*

The noise coming from the motor blade is loud but Harry is yelling over it and trying his best to explain his deductions to both Liam and Niall sitting in front of him before they get to some town, with a name he can’t be bothered to remember, forty-five minutes from London.

Harry told Niall he read about this case, but he was in a bad place at that time and wouldn’t have been of much help. Niall is itching to ask about it, but now wasn’t the time

Sonia Morales was a Brazilian nineteen-year-old golfer. She was found in a lake six years ago and according to the necropsy she suffered from sexual assault and then suffocation which ultimately killed her. It made it to the news because some kids found her one morning and they thought she was a ghost due to the white dress she was wearing as well as her long black hair. She had not family or friends in the country other than her manager since she came to London that summer to compete in a golf tournament and find herself some sponsors. And she did, at the Club Gala the last night of the tournament: The McKleins.

The body was too wet and wrinkled to find out the exact date of her death or any DNA from her killer.

“You think Dylan abused her and killed her?” Niall screams through the intercom. “At what? 17?”

“And someone saw it,” Harry nods. “And they died for it.”

The helicopter lands on the golf course and Harry runs to the cabin near the seventh hole with Liam and Niall at his side and a bunch of policemen following behind them, but when Liam takes down the door all they find is a body lying on a chair with a bullet hole on his head, holding a bloody golf club in one hand and a gun in the other.

“That’s Sonia’s father,” Liam says behind them, putting back his gun into its holster.

Niall knew the wounds in Dylan’s head would match the end of the golf club, he had studied those photographs enough to be able to draw them himself. When they get back, they find Dylan’s family in Liam’s office. They all stand up the moment the three of them walk in. Both women have red eyes again, evidence that they’ve been crying, and Gregory McKlein walks up to Harry, extending his hand him. “You said you’ll catch his killer. Thank you.” Harry takes his hand and shakes it.

“You said you’ll catch his killer.” Harry extended his hand and shake it. “Thank you.”

“I caught more than that,” Harry says, putting his hand back into his pocket. He walks over to the window and sighs. “Does the name ‘Sonia Morales’ ring a bell to you?” Harry turns to look at them and Niall can see how the couple turns to each other, physically jumping.

“No,” he says, firmly.

 “Let me refresh your memory then,” Harry smiles. “She was the last golfer you were going to sponsor before you moved to London, but you found your son abusing her and trying to shut her up with a pillow over her head until she wasn’t breathing anymore.” The room fell silent as Gregory gaped at Harry.

“What the fucking are you saying?!” He screams directly at Harry’s face.

“But you weren’t the first people to find him, were you?” Harry stands, proudly in front of him with Liam behind him, fearless. “It was your sister and her husband. Is that not right, Mrs. McKlein? You see, the same night Sonia was murdered, a car accident happened near the Golf Club. A couple died that night, the car fell off a cliff but their daughter survived.”

The woman walks to them, elegant and determined, with fire in her eyes and rage in her hands as she points her finger at Harry’s chest.

“Are you making fun of our pain?” she whispers, looking at Harry’s eyes. “Do you find this entertaining?”

“No,” he says and turns to look at Leyla McKlein. “But she does.”

They all stare at her. She’s standing there with a blank expression on her face, her hands behind her back and suddenly, she looks so much older than a minute ago.

“You forgot one witness.” Harry walks past them and approaches Leyla but she doesn’t move, she doesn’t speak, she doesn’t even flinch. “So when you walked in and saw what was happening you tried to talk to your sister and her husband, but they weren’t listening. I imagine they were already calling the police and leaving to get in their car.”

Doris McKlein in now behind her husband and they’re looking at Harry the same way they all look at him at the end of the day: with hatred in their eyes.

“Then the fatal accident happened, but when Leyla didn’t die, you decided to adopt her. You changed her name, took care of her and even loved her like your own,” Harry finishes, looking at Liam and nodding. “But it doesn’t matter how far you run, the past will always catch up.”

This is when Liam steps up. “You’re under arrest for the murder on Alice and Brenan Addley.”

Another two officers enter Liam’s room and handcuff the McKleins, taking them out as they yell about nonsense and lack of proof, how Harry’s over just like Liam’s career. Leyla McKlein is taken out of the office too, but to the interrogation room instead with Liam following close behind.

Niall breathes out all the air he didn’t know he was holding since this case started. He presses the button to call the lift and they wait, nodding at people who talk to them about one thing or the other until the door opens and they can finally leave.  It’s raining when they step out of Scotland Yard and they wait for a cab to stop in front of them.

“No one is going to buy it.” Niall says, looking at Harry’s profile as he turns to him just for a second. “The father and the sister doing this alone,” he says, moving his hand around like he’s trying to explain the situation, but the truth is, he has other thing in his mind. They need to talk about the kisses. “The names? The letter? All this time waiting?”

“Or maybe someone else did all the work.” Harry turns to him, slightly looking down at him. “Maybe they just waited and tipped them off. I don’t doubt she is smart,” Harry explains, “because she is. But to execute something at this range.” He shakes his head, looking in front of him as he has the answers in display, it’s just going too fast to see it clearly now. “They had to have help, from someone with contacts and power.”

Niall frowns and looks up at Liam’s office where he should be questioning Leyla McKlein. Who was Harry talking about? Someone that would guide two broken people to do something this atrocious? What kind of person is that? How do you find them?

“Are you gonna tell Liam?” He asks.

“Not now,” Harry says, frowning. “Not until I know who is behind all this.”

 Niall is about to reply when he sees a familiar black car park in front of them and then, a red umbrella stepping out of the vehicle. The woman he saw a little more than a month ago is walking towards them dressed in a black dress, wearing a perfectly clean white coat and red heels, matching the color on her lips. She’s looking at Harry with a smile on her face but Harry is still talking to him, paying her no attention, making Niall’s heart beat even faster. Is he in danger?

“Harry,” Niall says under his breath, pulling on his coat sleeve.

“If you’re questioning my moral compass just now, Niall, I’m sorry to tell you-”

“That’s the woman!” Niall says louder, making Harry turn at the same time she stops in front of him, holding her red umbrella and taking off her sunglasses.

“Afternoon, Sherlock.”

Harry gives her a look, from head to toe. He’s not afraid of her, he almost looks… bored. He takes a couple of steps further but Niall stops him, pulling him by the sleeve again. They don’t know if she has people with her right now.

“What are you doing here?” Harry asks, sounding irritated as he shakes Niall off and goes to stand in front of her.

“As ever, I’m concerned about you.” She closes her umbrella when she’s under the roof with the two of them, using the umbrella as a walking stick.

“Yeah, I’ve been hearing about your _concern_ ,” he says between his teeth and Niall looks away. The woman laughs and gives Niall a smile.

“Always so aggressive,” she says as she clears his coat from non-existent dust, fixing up the collar of his shirt, like she knows he likes to wear it that way. “Never occurred to you that you and I belong on the same side?”

Harry laughs, stridently, catching the attention of almost everyone around them. “Oddly enough, no.”

She lets go of his clothes goes and starts walking around them, looking at the building and the people going in and out, looking and the police cars and hearing the sirens. She breathes it all in, but she’s not intimidated. She acts like she owns the place, like she’s been here hundreds of times before, like she’s the one who calls the shots.

“We have more in common than you’d like to believe.” She walks behind them, making the umbrella tap the floor with every step she takes, putting that sound in the back of Niall’s mind. “This petty feud between us is simply childish.” and now she sounds irritated. She’s mad. “People will suffer,” she snarls and Niall wonders if he’s the only one listening to this conversation, “and you know how it always upsets _mummy_.”

_What?_

Niall frowns and looks at her and then at Harry. Their expressions haven’t changed at all. They’re still standing back to back, extremely dramatic as the raindrops hit the floor and people’s steps are the only sound that can compete with the water hitting.

“I upset her?” Harry turns to face her. “Me?!” He’s screaming now but she doesn’t react at all. All she does is cross her arms and look at him like it’s not the first time she has dealt with this. “It wasn’t me that upset her, Mycroft!”

“No, no,” Niall says, shaking his head as he gets closer to them. “Wait.” He lifts his finger, pointing at both of their faces and taking one second to think. “Mummy? Who is mummy?”

“Mother,” Harry answer, as if it that was obvious. “Our mother.” He points to himself and then to the woman in front of him. “This is my sister, Gemma. But she goes by Mycroft. Also putting on weight again as far as I can see.”

“Losing it, in fact.” She smiles back with murder written in her eyes, ignoring Niall completely.

“She’s your sister?” Niall whispers to Harry, his eyes wide open and his hand on Harry’s arm.

“Of course she’s my sister.” Harry frowns at Niall and he can see it now, the resemblance.

The shape of the face, the nose and even the lips if he pays enough attention. Her eyes are green, just like Harry’s, just a bit darker but he can see fire within them. The way she moves, the way she smiles and the way she talks like she knows everything and anything about everyone. Yeah, he can see it now.

“She’s not…?” Niall says but stops immediately. It sounds so ridiculous now.

“Not what?” Harry asks, leaning his head to the side.

“I don’t know…” Niall lets Harry’s arm go as he slowly turns to look at the woman next to him, Harry’s sister, Gemma Holmes, apparently. “A criminal mastermind?”

Harry smiles, nodding as he looks at Gemma. “Well, almost.”

“For goodness sake!” she screams out, stomping her foot on the floor and turning her hands into fists. “I occupy a minor position in the British Government.”

“She _is_ the British Government.” Harry ignores his sister as he talks to Niall directly. “When she’s not too busy being the British Secret Service, or the CIA on a freelance basis. Let’s go, John,” he says if Gemma didn’t already know his name. “Good evening, Gemma. Try not to start a war before I get home, you know what it does to the traffic.” And then he’s off to call a cab with an extended arm.

“So,” she says. Niall doesn’t need to see her face to know what she’s about to ask, he understands now. “You’ll stay.” He nods and puts his hands in his pockets. He has decided he wants to make Harry suffer a little longer for not telling him the scary woman was his sister.

“Did you bring me a car?!” Harry yells from the other side of the street.

“Why would I bring you a car?!” Gemma yells back. “Buy your own one.”

And that’s when Niall laughs. He starts walking towards Harry when Gemma opens her umbrella and catches up with him.

“Dr. Watson?” Niall looks at her in surprised. After this last couple of months, his own name sound strange. “Take care of him.”

And then she’s gone. She gets into the black car and disappears in the middle of the rain. Niall goes to Harry and stands next to him. He whistles, making two cars stop in front of them. He walks to the nearest one and opens the door for him.

“You should have done that sooner,” Harry says as he steps inside. “Our lives are quite busy, Watson.”

Niall smiles, looking down at the floor as he closes the cab’s door behind him.

“To Baker Street.”

 


End file.
